bluemando
Member
Here is my question - information follows.
I am having ETC SmartBars tripping breakers. Is there some test I can set up to mimic a pair of 575watt lamps - to show whether the dimmer bar is or is not the source of the problem?
So that is my question and here is a description of our system and the problem we are having:
Our ETC House and Stage lighting system (Phase I) was purchased and installed in 2007 and included all the base building electrical work. We started with (5) SB6-10M-B and (2) SB4-6-B SmartBars, Ion Console; Unison Dimmer Rack, Architectural Control Unit, DMX Repeater, etcetera, etcetera - the whole system is ETC.
We had an electrical engineer review and electricial company install all new building service panels and distro for the lighting system - we defered the house lighting for some time but that's installed now. Now the only part of the system not installed as designed are wall washers and additional dimmer bars and fixtures.
All of our fixtures are SourceFour Elipsoidals and Pars with Edison Connectors. We made up Distro cables from 3/12 SO and SJO Cable and our dealer recommended using Black Cube Taps for two-fers. I am guessing that our longest cable run is 50ft with an average of maybe 25ft - we bought lots of cable so almost all the runs are a single cable. We are lamping with 575x lamps throughout.
From the start we had to limit the dimmer bars to 90% to keep breakers on the SmartBars from tripping with (2) fixtures on a 10A dimmer. As I recall, some of the dimmers loaded with a pair of 575's tripped instantly untill we dummed the bars down to 90%. The dealer said to check our cabling - but as we have no catwalks and the facility is used nearly every day of the week I failed to get to the bottom of the issue in a timely manner. But I do check the cables as I go along and have not found anything - no burned up Edison connectors or loose terminations.
We did have one L21-20P connector get hot and burn - totally our fault due to a bad wiring job. That's been fixed and I checked the others and they all look perfect.
We just purchased a pair of SmartBar 2's and they both are they too are tripping breakers when we have a pair of lights connected. Not every channel, but some are consistantly tripping.
For our facility we have the dimmer channels at 100% for long periods of time.
The only weak point in all of this in my mind would be using these cube-taps. But it seems like they are pretty common and the most they see are a pair of 575w lamps and I have not seen any evidence of a cube tap getting hot - not even once.
That is all the relevant information I can think to include. It seems that there are 3 potential sources, the extension cabling we made up, the 14amp Cube Taps (which I think are not the problem) and/or the dimmer bars. I did check the voltage to the dimmers with my meter and it reads 120V. ???
Thanks for any help with this - I would love to sort this out.
I am having ETC SmartBars tripping breakers. Is there some test I can set up to mimic a pair of 575watt lamps - to show whether the dimmer bar is or is not the source of the problem?
So that is my question and here is a description of our system and the problem we are having:
Our ETC House and Stage lighting system (Phase I) was purchased and installed in 2007 and included all the base building electrical work. We started with (5) SB6-10M-B and (2) SB4-6-B SmartBars, Ion Console; Unison Dimmer Rack, Architectural Control Unit, DMX Repeater, etcetera, etcetera - the whole system is ETC.
We had an electrical engineer review and electricial company install all new building service panels and distro for the lighting system - we defered the house lighting for some time but that's installed now. Now the only part of the system not installed as designed are wall washers and additional dimmer bars and fixtures.
All of our fixtures are SourceFour Elipsoidals and Pars with Edison Connectors. We made up Distro cables from 3/12 SO and SJO Cable and our dealer recommended using Black Cube Taps for two-fers. I am guessing that our longest cable run is 50ft with an average of maybe 25ft - we bought lots of cable so almost all the runs are a single cable. We are lamping with 575x lamps throughout.
From the start we had to limit the dimmer bars to 90% to keep breakers on the SmartBars from tripping with (2) fixtures on a 10A dimmer. As I recall, some of the dimmers loaded with a pair of 575's tripped instantly untill we dummed the bars down to 90%. The dealer said to check our cabling - but as we have no catwalks and the facility is used nearly every day of the week I failed to get to the bottom of the issue in a timely manner. But I do check the cables as I go along and have not found anything - no burned up Edison connectors or loose terminations.
We did have one L21-20P connector get hot and burn - totally our fault due to a bad wiring job. That's been fixed and I checked the others and they all look perfect.
We just purchased a pair of SmartBar 2's and they both are they too are tripping breakers when we have a pair of lights connected. Not every channel, but some are consistantly tripping.
For our facility we have the dimmer channels at 100% for long periods of time.
The only weak point in all of this in my mind would be using these cube-taps. But it seems like they are pretty common and the most they see are a pair of 575w lamps and I have not seen any evidence of a cube tap getting hot - not even once.
That is all the relevant information I can think to include. It seems that there are 3 potential sources, the extension cabling we made up, the 14amp Cube Taps (which I think are not the problem) and/or the dimmer bars. I did check the voltage to the dimmers with my meter and it reads 120V. ???
Thanks for any help with this - I would love to sort this out.